


Missing Time

by whyamilike_this



Series: U-694verse [4]
Category: Rick and Morty
Genre: And a Girlfriend!, BAMF Summer, Summer is a good sister, With a lot of Emotional Issues
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-28
Updated: 2019-12-28
Packaged: 2021-02-26 04:47:26
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 15,010
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21997732
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/whyamilike_this/pseuds/whyamilike_this
Summary: “I think I let something bad happen to my sister,” Summer whispered in the dark, but she hadn’t meant to say the words out loud.She wasn’t sure if she was talking to the plexiglass ceiling, the universe beyond, or the half-naked woman lying next to her in bed, but the thought had hit her like an axe and now a new crushing anxiety poured out of the gaping hole in the side of her head.(Or the one where Summer sees something she wished she hadn't.)
Relationships: Morticia (Pocket Mortys)/Rick Sanchez (Rick and Morty), Rick Sanchez/Morty Smith
Series: U-694verse [4]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1359898
Comments: 22
Kudos: 123





	Missing Time

“I think I let something bad happen to my sister,” Summer whispered in the dark, but she hadn’t meant to say the words out loud.

She wasn’t sure if she was talking to the plexiglass ceiling, the universe beyond, or the half-naked woman lying next to her in bed, but the thought hit her like an axe and now a new crushing anxiety poured out of the gaping hole in the side of her head.

Nira shifted, the mattress dipping as she rolled over and Summer was sure she was being watched, could make out the gold gleam of Nira’s cat-slit eyes in her peripheral vision, but she didn’t have the nerve to turn and face her own thoughts head on. Not like that. Not yet.

“What do you mean?” Nira asked, her voice soft and concerned but not doting. Open to listening but not overly sympathetic. It was one of the many things that had originally attracted Summer to her – Nira didn’t put up with bullshit but she hadn’t hardened herself to the world either. Summer hoped, one day, that she might find that balance too.

As it was, Summer knew too well how much of a bitch she was, how cruel and bitter and selfish. But life wasn’t easy and she had long ago decided she’d rather be the boot than the bug crushed underneath.

“My little sister,” Summer said, her voice flat and a little raspy from the joint she’d been smoking until she lost herself in thought. She pulled it up to her lips only to find it had gone out. She dropped the cold butt blindly onto the nightstand to re-light later. “… _Morty_.”

Summer didn’t know why it was suddenly so hard to shape her sister’s name in her mouth - she’d used to say it at least twice a day when they squabbled over the shower or who got control of the remote. _Morty._ But that felt like a lifetime ago; like she had been a different Summer back then, and imagining that she’d ever been that young and naïve felt impossible after all the shit she’d seen.

“You don’t often mention your sister,” Nira said and there wasn’t anything accusatory in the tone but there _could_ have been.

Her and Nira had been fucking regularly for almost a year now and exclusive for close to eight months. Summer had met Nira’s twelve littermates, knew her mom’s address by heart, and had her grandmother’s phone number saved in her phone.

In their relationship, Nira had opened up like a flower to the sun. Summer held her hand through hard times, held a _gun_ to the head of the man who had raided her childhood village and pulled the trigger, held her heart in her hands when Nira lost her best friend on a rescue mission gone horribly astray. Summer had seen Nira deliriously happy and brimming with righteous fury and utterly devastated.

Nira had bared her soul, _fearlessly_ , but Summer was still stuck. Emotionally distant. Unchanged. _Broken_.

On hard nights, Summer knew that her inability to open up was going to wind up pushing Nira away but some doors were better kept closed and locked, shut up in the part of Summer’s memory she tried her hardest not to tread.

In all their time together, Morty had come up once, a long time ago, when they were still in the early start of their relationship and their time was spent asking each other frivolous questions. Even then, Summer knew it would be a bad idea to straight up lie, she could tell from the hard gleam in Nira’s eyes that lies would be found out and deemed unacceptable. So Summer said, ‘ _I’ve got a little sister but we don’t talk much_ ,’ and that was true. It didn’t _used to be_ but they had grown apart, somehow. And maybe that was for the best. For some reason, thinking too much about Morty hurt Summer’s head and made her chest ache and some Pavlovian response had trained her not to dwell on her absent little sister.

Now that Summer’s thought strayed once again to Morty, the familiar headache was back and that hole in her heart was expanding and Summer _knew_ she’d fucked up by playing her cards too close to her chest but Nira’s posture was still relaxed. She didn’t shift to cover her bare chest or start that angry hiss in her throat that warned Summer they were about to fight. Instead, her four fingered hand found Summer’s and laced their digits together comfortably, like they were made to fit.

“Guess I don’t talk about her much.” Summer sighed. “I’m kind of a crappy sister.”

“What makes you say that?” Nira’s voice was a purr in the dark – literally a purr, she was of an alien race that bore more than a passing resemblance to cats on earth. Their ancestors had inspired the ancient Egyptians into cat-worshipping and knowing Nira, Summer could see why that made sense.

“I guess…” Summer started, lured into the hypnotic place of comfort she always sank to when Nira’s chest started rumbling, “…I kinda bailed on her.”

‘ _Kinda bailed on her_ ’ was probably an understatement.

After what _Jerry_ had done, Summer promised herself she’d _be there_ for her little sister. That she’d be dependable, even if no one else in their fucking family could be. And she tried. She _really fucking tried_.

But she was eighteen and other kids her age didn’t have to deal with that sort of shit and she hated everything about her family except Morty. (Though sometimes - maybe even _especially_ \- she hated Morty too.) And when Grandpa Rick gave her a spaceship, he handed her a ticket to pave her own way across the universe.

So _of course_ she’d taken it and flown off to every planet, every waystation, every deserted hell-hole, every perfect utopia, _anywhere_ with enough flat land to put her ship down on. She was _free_. Free to forget and free to live.

And Morty was _supposed_ to be safe with Grandpa – with _Rick_ \- that was the _deal_.

When Summer left, Morty was still a teenager. Probably sixteen or seventeen; it was hard to nail down now, so many years later. Morty was standing in the foyer of the house they grew up in while Summer hauled the few possessions she’d cherished enough to warrant a quick stop back to earth before the new owners moved in.

When Summer passed them on the way out, Rick had his arm around Morty’s shoulders as he waved her off. The thought made Summer clench her jaw and close her eyes against the memory, and she couldn’t remember whether his grin had actually been so self-satisfied, so _leering_ , or if it only seemed that way now was because of Summer’s sickening shift in understanding.

Whatever the case was, he had his arm around her shoulder like it was his God-given right to have it there while Morty watched Summer heft a box of clothes and old diaries and Grandma Smith’s hand-me-down jewelry down the stairs and out the front door.

Summer had called back something like ‘ _See you around, Morty_ ,’ and then she was gone leaving _that house_ and _that life_ behind her.

At the time she hadn’t given Morty a second thought – hadn’t asked herself how her sister was thinking or feeling because she was in the middle of something that, at the time, had seemed much more important. Now, Summer hadn’t the faintest memory of what that was. So even though peripherally she knew Morty had been pouting, big eyes watery with almost-shed tears, she hadn’t let herself get drawn into that drama and reassured herself that Grandpa Rick would cheer her up, just like he always did.

_Regret_ wasn’t the right word to describe Summer’s feelings when she looked back at that moment but there was a heavy weight on her heart that hadn’t been there before.

At first, Summer kept up with Morty and Rick. Morty would call every few months with plans to hang out and admittedly the two of them knew the _best_ places in the multiverse. Beautiful beaches. Rowdy bars. Exotic festivals. Spending time with them was _fun_ and looking back Summer’s stomach turned over in remembrance of happy outings, of Rick’s hand on the back of Morty’s neck, of the indulgent smile Rick would smirk at them with when Morty ran ahead laughing in delight.

Sometimes Summer would get roped into whatever bullshit they’d gotten themselves wrapped up in, which was an easy way to make some extra cash so she never complained. Grandpa always compensated her for her trouble (maybe _too_ well and Summer suspected Morty’s hand in that but wasn’t about to bring that fact to attention) and he almost always threw her something fun as a bonus; like a bag of weed or nifty new gun.

And despite the hugeness of the universe, they bumped into each other fairly frequently.

Or at least they _used_ to.

The last time she saw them – the time before earlier that night - was through a pair of binoculars as she did reconnaissance for a group of rebel fighters on Tratus _years_ ago. They were sneaking through the demolished remains of a city, Rick’s hand wrapped around Morty’s wrist as he dragged her inadvertently towards an enemy search party guarding the street a block over.

Summer had no idea what they were doing there and it probably wasn’t anything good but without considering the ramifications of her actions, she swung her rocket launcher onto her shoulder and blasted the smattering of soldiers to kingdom-come. She swiveled her sights over in time to be impressed with how fast Rick pulled Morty into his chest, shielding her as they were pelted with small pieces of debris, his hand cradling the back of her head.

Summer’s brain stalled over the memory, her eyes pulsing with the start of a headache when she remembered the possessive way he’d curved his bigger body around hers. Even back then something had niggled in the back of her mind like a warning but she brushed it off. She _wanted_ Grandpa to shield Morty. That was exactly what she would have done in his place. And in the moment she had breathed out a strange sigh of relief to know that – even though they got up to some truly fucked up stuff –Rick was watching out for her little sister.

‘ _Just saved your life, bitch_ ’ she texted Rick and she watched him pull out his phone and read the message through her rocket launcher’s scope. Then, with a surety that was fucking _terrifying_ when he was miles away and her invisi-fiber mesh should have blended her into the scenery perfectly, he swiveled up his head and made goddamn eye-contact with her through the scope.

‘ _Drinks on me_ ’ he texted back and flipped her off before shoving Morty through a portal and disappearing.

Her rash actions had given up her position and she wound up spending the afternoon getting chased under a hail of bullets but Summer was only moderately annoyed. They would have handled themselves just fine without her help but there was something about Morty and her denim shorts and yellow blouse that looked so painfully young and out of place in all that destruction that Summer couldn’t stand to watch from two miles away as her little sister got shot at by alien Nazis.

Weirdly, after that, their relationship petered out. Summer wasn’t entirely sure what happened or why. Rick had promised her drinks after all and she had planned on holding him to his word but she never followed through. She couldn’t remember why.

And texts that used to be casual but relatively constant trickled down to almost nothing. Morty stopped pushing so hard to hang out every few months. And whatever the two of them were up to, they stopped running into each other out in the wild.

It sat with Summer strange but as long as they still responded to her yearly check in text, she told herself they were fine. Rick could take care of Morty. And Morty wasn’t _helpless_ , Summer had seen what she could do with a gun and a ship and knife, but still she had been glad Grandpa was looking out for her.

Now that thought made her want to throw up.

Summer saw the wanted posters a few years later. The first time she came across one, she snapped a picture of it to keep on her phone and occasionally she pulled it up in quiet moments to contemplate. The mugshot had been taken when Morty was a teenager, her face pale and worried and still round with baby fat. And those brown eyes that always seemed just on the verge of tears were trying to tell Summer something – something important – but it had been a while since Summer had needed to read her sister’s riotous expressions and she’d lost touch with the skill.

Maybe that’s why she couldn’t leave the picture alone.

“You think something bad happened to her?” Nira’s voice gently broke her out of her reverie and Summer tilted her head enough to take in the softly furred features of the only person she’d ever have this conversation with. The first person she’d let herself half-trust since that afternoon in mom and dad’s room an eternity ago.

Nira’s yellow eyes practically glowed in the dark and at their slit center, the universe folded in half. Summer intentionally drew her thoughts away from that closed door - carefully keeping it buried, keeping it hidden, keeping it lost - and dragged herself back to the present.

“I saw her tonight,” Summer admitted quietly, hating how raw her voice sounded in the dark. “I saw Morty.”

Nira paused, obviously a little surprised, but she covered it smoothly by asking, “And what you saw worried you?”

Summer bit her lip. “Yeah.” She exhaled slowly.

Nira shifted, turning over to face Summer fully on the bed – a wordless invitation.

It was always so invasive, such a shock to let someone else submerge themselves into her memories and drag them to the surface, but she needed to be there again, to be _sure_ of what she’d seen. Because this night could change _everything_ if she let it so there was no room for error.

Summer rolled over and scooted closer to Nira until their knees touched, curling her arm under her head and trying to get comfortable. Trying to relax. It didn’t come naturally to her – opening up and letting someone else in. She had to manually walk through her psyche and unlock the right doors, keeping the worst things trapped upstairs even if she could still hear the pounding on the other side of it. The pounding never stopped – not really – but most nights it was easier to ignore.

With one last deep breath, Summer mentally braced herself for impact and then she locked onto the gold starburst of Nira’s irises and felt herself fold into Nira’s eyes, fold into the new memory of Morty, fold into the past.

And she didn’t want to live it all again but she had to. She _had_ to.

The bar was a dive, the divey-est bar Summer had been in since she’d met Nira and started campaigning with her band of altruistic mercenary friends. But they’d just saved a small homesteading family from a band of cannibal raiders on Jarvae Theta IX and that crowded shit-hole was the closest place with enough alcohol to adequately celebrate their victory.

Summer wandered to the bar to grab the next round of beers when her eyes caught on another young woman – human from the look of her unmarked face and long brown hair, earthling or tangential from the light yellow dress Summer glanced over with interest.

The young woman was stirring her drink with a stick piercing a maraschino cherry while her gaze traveled the room – over the bottles behind the counter, flashing to the four-armed Globulite behind the bar pulling Summer’s beers, and then trailing back to the empty seat next to her almost longingly.

When Summer realized why the brown hair, brown eyes, and slightly pouty lips all seemed so familiar, Summer nearly spilled the beers she’d just picked up.

Morty was almost unrecognizable. It had been – jeez – _at least_ three years. Maybe more. Morty must be in her twenties now, evidenced by her sitting at a barstool without any of the awkward I-just-turned-twenty-one nerves, but Summer still couldn’t quite believe her eyes.

_Holy shit_. That _woman_ was _Morty_.

“Did you speak to her?” Nira’s soothing voice infiltrated her recollection, strengthening the vague vision and painting broad stroke across the room. Summer was there again, she was _living_ it again. She could feel the condensation on the glass under her hands and the sticky pull of dried blood clinging to her inner elbows.

And her eyes had just alighted on Morty, _her sister_ , and the unbelievable chance encounter of running into her in some hick-ass bar in the middle of nowhere after _years_ without laying eyes on her was still rocking through Summer’s frame like a punch to the stomach.

She was compelled to answer Nira’s question by a soft echo, ‘ _did you speak to her?_ ’

“No,” Summer slurred, the words hard to shape in her mouth as she fought against the memory.

“Why not?” Nira’s voice softly droned over the crappy music playing from the corner jukebox and Summer ran a hand over the tight French braid crowning her head just like she had earlier, smoothing the wisps where her bangs were still growing out and straightening the hard line of her duro-flesh armor.

She had consumed enough liquor to think approaching her slightly estranged sister in the middle of a crowded alien dive bar was a good idea and had just worked up the nerve to start walking over (even though her heart was beating out a frantic pace like she’d just gotten herself into a shoot-out) when Morty turned, her face splitting into a delighted grin when her eyes landed on something – or someone – making their way through the crowd to Summer’s right.

_Oh_ , Summer thought, an irrational spiral of dread pooling in her stomach, _Morty was on a_ date. That explained the dress. And the lack of Grandpa.

Summer’s head twinged, the start of a dull headache – probably all the drinking, maybe she should slow down – but she ignore the pulse of low-level pain and re-concentrated on Morty who was a _much_ more interesting topic.

Suddenly Summer was _dying_ to know what kind of person a twenty-something Morty would light up for like a fucking Christmas tree and she turned her head, eyes scanning through the tightly packed throng of creatures.

Her eyes picked him out of the crowd without meaning to.

Pale blue hair, a white coat, and a hard jaw came into view, tall shoulders shoving through the crowd to reach Morty as she swiveled to him with a smile. Then a gnarled hand was smoothing over Morty’s wild locks and Grandpa – _Rick_ – was pressing a quick kiss to Morty’s forehead the same way he used to all the time back on earth when Morty was much closer to a child than an adult.

“I didn’t want to…” Summer started in a dreamy fog, trying to answer Nira’s question through the punch of shock hitting her all over again. In her memory, Morty smiled, closing her eyes at the gesture and grinning so wide her nose scrunched up.

And then Rick leaned in and Morty tilted her head up and they were kissing. On the mouth. In public.

“… I _couldn’t_ interrupt.”

The floor dropped out from under Summer and she was briefly falling through space, through time, to some half-formed dream of Rick gritting out at her, ‘ _I can kiss Morty as much as I fucking want, Summer_ ,’ but then she blinked as that faint recollection was shattered into a million pieces and lost to a bright flash of light.

Nira and her stared at each other through the dark, Nira’s brow furrowed in confusion.

“What was that?” she asked softly, obviously disturbed, but Summer’s head was fuzzy from the shock of Nira pulling out of her mind so suddenly.

“What was what?” Summer asked dimly, confused, her head starting to ache.

Nira frowned, visibly shaking away her unease before she turned her lamplight eyes back to Summer who promptly folded back into infinity and dove head first through her memories.

“Did she look unwell?” Nira’s voice prompted, an edge of concern starting to lace her tone.

“No,” Summer answered. _Had_ to answer. Because that was the truth. Morty didn’t look unwell, she looked… _happy_. She still fiddled with the glowing necklace at her sternum and she still worried her lower lip between her teeth and she _still_ hadn’t figured out how to cope with her not-quite-curly hair, but she was _radiant_.

Summer had never seen Morty smile so much, her cheeks dimpling with the stretch of her lips. The light, airy dress showed a flash of skin between her (still small) breasts, the cut a deep V that spoke of a confidence in herself and her body that Summer envied. When she talked, her hands moved with the story, quick to cover her mouth when she giggled or lift to tuck her hair behind her ear or touch gently at Rick’s gnarled hand like the contact was second nature.

Morty had grown into a confident woman. A _happy_ woman. And Summer didn’t realize it until that moment but she had never thought that outcome was in her sister’s cards.

With Rick beside her, she came alive. She nodded towards the barman and said something – Summer couldn’t hear, they were too far away – and Rick erupted into laughter. _That_ she heard and the sound of it triggered Summer in a million different ways, teleported her back to the house she couldn’t stand and the family that happily ignored her and a hundred nights spent lying staring at the ceiling and counting down the days till she could leave.

“Was she behaving oddly?” Nira’s deep, beautiful voice rumbled and Summer was sure that back where her body was, the words were whispered into her ear. But in her recreated memory, in the dark recess of her mind, the question hovered around the ceiling like a trapped balloon.

Summer turned her attention back to her sister and Rick. Besides the unsettling nature of seeing the scrawny teenager suddenly so grown up and _kissing Rick_ , somehow none of that seemed out of character for Morty – even the kissing part. Morty had _always_ gone along with whatever Grandpa wanted, hadn’t she? “No,” Summer breathed aloud softly, the barman too distracted cleaning glasses to catch her quiet exhalation and her admission mirrored the word she’d whispered to herself in disbelief.

It was Rick. _Rick_ was acting weird. Rick was _doing things_ he shouldn’t be doing. To _Morty_.

His fingers toyed with the string tying the top of Morty’s dress behind her neck. His hands kept darting to her wrist or her hair or her shoulder or her necklace, his touches practiced and possessive. When the drunk alien in the seat next to Morty listed too far into her space, Rick scowled and shoved him off her, tucking her closer to his side. And between the quick scans he took of the room – predatory and efficient; something Summer recognized as a man keeping tabs on the exits – his eyes were locked on his youngest granddaughter, the sharp blue of his gaze liquid and electric like he wanted to drop her in his shot glass and pour her down his throat.

_He_ hadn’t aged a day. If anything, he looked younger, the perma-scowl that Summer had considered his neutral expression almost wiped from his face, an eerie sort of lazy contentment replacing it.

Summer slipped back into the crowd, hiding herself behind an overfed Korblagorv where she could still observe the pair between writhing tentacles but hopefully remain unseen.

She could feel the cool prickle of dread climbing her spine like a spider. If Rick saw her – if he knew she had seen what he was doing to Morty…

She was glad for her recently shaved Mohawk, dyed green hair, and the ceremonial markings Nira had painted on her before they’d slaughtered that tribe of cannibals. It wasn’t a perfect disguise but so far Rick hadn’t recognized her, _thank fucking god_.

Rick Sanchez was the most dangerous man in the universe – that was something she had _thought_ she knew when they shared a roof but it wasn’t until she’s bounced around a few galaxies that she really got the whole picture.

That bounty poster she still had saved to her phone – the one that put Rick’s seething face right next to Morty’s drawn features and declared them both wanted ‘ _dead or alive_ ’ – had shown his eyes burning with a need for revenge, for retribution. And when she’d found out that he’d taken out the mob boss who’d put that price on their heads by _destroying an entire star system_ , she figured maybe it wasn’t so bad that they saw each other a lot less than they used to.

She’d seen him beat people he introduced as his friends half to death for minor slights. She’d heard him cut mom down to almost nothing with a single sentence when he was in a bad mood. She’d watched that cold gleam in his eyes spark in excitement when he’d portaled dad – _Jerry_ – to who the fuck knows where, never to be seen again.

Standing in that crowded bar, watching him pick the cherry out of Morty’s drink and hold it to her lips, Summer wasn’t going to bet her life on the hope he’d spare her because she was _family_.

Summer turned to glance at her friends, the three rowdy women smeared with blood and making a lot of noise in the corner. In her real memory, Nira had held up her beer glass and toasted their friends, unaware of Summer’s oddly desperate glance in her direction. But in this dreamlike replay, Nira stood still amongst the crowd, looking at Summer with bottomless eyes.

Nira opened her mouth and asked, “Then why do you think something bad has happened?” and even though it should be impossible for Summer to hear the soft spoken words amongst all the rabble, they thundered across the room like a tidal wave.

“Because she –” Summer started, almost pleading, and when she turned back to her sister, it was to watch Rick stand up, throw a handful of punctured coins on the table and tower over Morty like a wraith. His massive hand encircled her throat and tilted her head up, and for one awful moment, Summer was sure he was going to clench his fist and strangle her.

But Morty tilted her head back at the pressure and their lips met again, her fingers lightly resting against his lined cheek, her mouth curving up into a smile before he pulled away.

And jeezus did she have to look so _happy_?

“It’s Rick,” Summer murmured, following them with her mercenary eyes as Rick tugged Morty off the bar stool and they pressed their way through the crowded room, his hand circling the back of her neck.

Then Summer blinked and she was back in the high-tech yurt her and Nira had been camping out in for the last couple months, a satellite arching across the sky on the other side of the glass ceiling.

“Who’s Rick?” Nira asked, her voice gentle and soft and Summer grimaced. There were too many things she hadn’t told Nira, too many secrets she had kept. And now they were all stacking up one on top of the other and if she wasn’t careful, Nira might realize how much better off she would be if she walked out the door and never looked back.

But the Smiths were full of Big Fucking Secrets and Summer had spent too many years holding onto so much shit. It hit a point that it seemed easier to keep _everything_ in rather than risk letting something slip. Better to try to put a little distance between her and all the things that hurt too damn much to think about all the time.

“He’s my – _our_ – mine and Morty’s grandpa. Rick Sanchez.” Nira’s eyes flashed in the dark. Summer wasn’t surprised she’d heard his name before, not with Nira’s line of work. Intergalactic crime lord sounded overdramatic but it wasn’t an inaccurate description of Rick at times. “I think he’s…” Morty’s brilliantly smiling face flashed in Summer’s mind and she made her voice firm when she finally concluded, “… he’s hurting her.”

Even as Summer said it, the word felt wrong in her mouth. Except there was _no other possible_ explanation – what Rick was doing was _wrong_. But if Morty was being _hurt_ why did she look so… okay? So _happy_? It didn’t add up.

Summer had _seen_ the after effects of trauma. The way some people never recovered. Mom and her drawn features and drinking problem. All the horrified faces of the aliens Summer saved from political injustice. Even her friends wore old wounds like tattered hand me downs – pain and past suffering clung to them in the dark set of their eyes, in the hard edge to their grins, in their feverish pursuit to do the right thing.

In comparison, Morty was downright happy-go-lucky.

“You should call her,” Nira offered and Summer was glad her girlfriend had the tact to abstain from drawing attention to the thickness in her voice that was just about as close as Summer got to crying. “Talk to her.”

“And tell her what?” Summer had meant to sound confrontational. She _hated_ that sort of advice. Talk it out. _Express yourself_. When she was younger that had been her mantra too. But it hadn’t worked with her parents and it hadn’t worked for her. At least, it hadn’t until Nira. So the question she’d intended to be a harsh, sarcastic snap sounded more like a desperate plea.

“Don’t tell her; _ask_ her,” Nira gently affirmed. “Ask her if she’s okay. Ask her if she needs a friend.”

Summer kept from rolling her eyes but only barely. She had enough friends already, thank you very much. And she was sick of watching out for a little sister who _apparently_ couldn’t take care of herself even though you’d think a lifetime as a magnet for perverted old men with a taste for incest might have given her more than enough hands-on experience.

Because – jeezus – if she let herself get mad about it, Morty was just too fucking _pathetic_.

Her whole life Morty was always three steps behind everyone else. She had to take her tests in a special room because she couldn’t handle distractions. Her school schedule got rearranged because of problems with bullying. She was always put in the easiest classes but _still_ barely scraped by – not that their parents _ever_ gave Morty shit for her grades. No they were all ‘ _Summer, was a B really the best you could do?_ ’ while they were happy so long as Morty passed her classes.

Being stupid had earned Morty special treatment her entire life and while Summer was glad to have inherited her mother’s intelligence, it wasn’t fair Morty got to take the straight, steady path of an idiot and _still_ wound up stumbling along.

And then Rick knocked on their door one night and suddenly life was different and strange and still bullshit, no mistake about that, but Summer’s eyes were fucking _opened_. Except even _Rick_ favored Morty, despite the fact that she was clumsy and stupid and awkward. Yet again Summer was neglected for her unspectacular little sister.

Looking back, Summer felt disgusted by that childish jealousy, honestly nauseas at the thought of all those nights that Morty and Rick didn’t bother coming home and she’d laid in bed making herself sick with envy. Because now there were so many questions to ask.

When was the _first_ time he kissed her? One of those nights Summer had been lying awake in bed? How old had Morty been? Had it ever occurred to her that she could say _no_? How much more than _kissing_ did he do to her?

Summer breathed out a long sigh and tried to glare a hole through the glass ceiling.

_When_ had Rick’s begrudging familial affection for Morty turned into something more sinister? Somehow the when felt _very_ important. Was it before the afternoon they found Jerry pounding into Morty’s drugged body? After? How _long_ after? And how long had Rick been grooming her, pulling her along at his pace, convincing an impressionable young girl that kissing her grandfather in a crowded bar was in any way okay?

It had to be after the whole _thing_ with Jerry. It wasn’t until then that Summer noticed an increase in the amount of physical affection between the two of them. At the time she’d wondered about that, mulled it over in her head, the memory of Jerry naked and sweating and _pawing at her little sister_ too fresh in her mind to disregard Rick’s massive hand wrapped around Morty’s upper arm.

But… he was so _open_ about it. If she had caught him kissing her on the forehead behind a closed door and he’d acted guilty about it she might have tackled him down the stairs. But he pressed his lips to Morty’s temple at the dinner table, he draped himself over her shoulder in front of mom, and he wrestled her on the couch in the middle of the day.

Sure, _Summer_ didn’t get any forehead kisses but she wouldn’t want them anyways. Rick was a drooler.

And after the whole _Jerry thing_ , Summer’s feelings were all over the place. She found herself touching Morty more too; ruffling her hair, patting her shoulder, pulling her in for hugs, subconsciously proving to herself that Morty was okay, that she was moving and breathing and not that terrifyingly still doll that she’d washed semen off of in a half-empty tub.

And it only made sense that Rick, who had _always_ seemed to have a very specific Morty-shaped soft spot, would be compelled to reassure himself too. Summer always suspected that he felt things more deeply than he let on and seeing Morty hurt had changed all of them.

So Summer ignored it. If mom wasn’t making a big deal out of it, Summer could leave it alone too. Not that she trusted her mom’s instincts – the exact opposite in fact – but she was sick of being the responsible one.

Besides, after the awful thing she’d witnessed and the subsequent complete loss of trust in adults it was easy to convince herself that she was being paranoid. What were the odds _every_ man in her life was complete garbage?

But now with new memories of that bar clinging to the backs of her eyes, she _hated_ herself for so stupidly ignoring all the warning signs just because the perpetrator was the impossibly brilliant _Grandpa Rick_. Even with her faint suspicions, she had still encouraged mom to move out before Morty graduated high school, pretty much delivering the young girl into Rick’s hands. And now Morty – twenty-something Morty with her lithe limbs and bright eyes and easy smile – was in a relationship with a man whose affection was abuse.

Nira was silently watching her with glowing yellow eyes and Summer could feel the weight of her gaze like a stroke across her skin.

She _should_ call Morty. She might be the only person in all the universe left to look out for her and even though Summer _hated_ that burden - had hated it ever since the first time she’d laid eyes on the lumpy baby mom and dad kept insisting was her little sister - she wasn’t _so_ broken that she could pretend she hadn’t seen anything and quietly move on with her life.

Her mouth was too dry to swallow but she tried anyways and turned to face her girlfriend head on. “You mind if I call her?” Summer asked, but it wasn’t quite what she wanted to ask. She wanted Nira with her, she wanted her to stay with her and do that quiet, unassuming encouragement thing that she sometimes did when Summer felt particularly lost. She wanted a buffer – even if Morty had no idea someone else was on the phone.

Luckily, Nira knew all that at just a glance. She didn’t even have to read Summer’s mind. “I’ll be right here.” As if to prove her point, she sat up and scooted up the bed until she was leaned against the headboard, the sheet tenting over her crossed legs.

Summer breathed out a long sigh through her nose and followed suit, feeling around blindly on the nightstand for her phone and pressing her knee against Nira’s. She wiped at her suddenly clammy forehead and spared a glance at her half-smoked joint but decided against lighting it back up again before she swiped through her contacts list to a name she hadn’t seen on her phone in years.

“She might not even have the same number,” Summer muttered, half hoping she’d wind up on the phone with a stranger (one that didn’t share some of her DNA, at least) and begging a god that she didn’t believe in that if it _were_ still Morty’s number, she’d let it ring unanswered, just as disturbed by a call from her estranged sister as Summer was to make the call.

Nira tilted her head and even though she kept her expression carefully flat, Summer chided herself for being such a little bitch. It was just a phone call. Why was she being so _stupid_? Earlier that day she had been beheading cannibals with a halberd. How was _this_ making her hands shake?

With a deep breath, she squared her shoulders and leaned forward, crossing her legs and cradling her phone in the palm of her hand.

Nira’s eyes met hers in the dark and with one touch of Summer’s finger to the screen, the other end started ringing. She put the call on speaker and held her phone aloft.

It rang just long enough for Summer to hope there would be no answer but right before the voicemail message started to play, a voice sounded from the other end.

“ _Summer_?” And oh god, that was her. _Morty._ She sounded the same, _exactly_ the same; that shy, pleading tone still coloring the edges of her words even if her voice was thick with sleep.

Summer was speechless, her throat filling up with pressure because she refused to let her eyes water. Morty had looked so different and it had been so long, somehow she’d thought it would be easier, talking to someone so unfamiliar. But she sounded the same and with _one single word_ she was back in that house on earth, jealousy and bitterness and spite curling up her insides and targeting _exactly_ the wrong person.

“Summer? Summer, are you okay?!” Morty started to fret and Nira nudged Summer’s knee with her own, breaking the spell and jolting Summer out of what she belatedly realized was an extended, shocked silence. “Rick, wake up - Summer’s in trouble -”

“ _No_! No, Morty, sorry, shit, I was just… spacing out.” She could hear deep, raspy grumbling, unmistakably Rick’s voice fogged up with sleep or liquor, and Summer’s stomach dropped. Was Rick so near to Morty’s side that all she had to do was turn over to wake him up? Were they _sleeping_ together? Were they half-dressed and tangled up in a sheet just like her and Nira?

The thought of it made Summer sick and she fought the urge to gag.

She could still hear Morty breathing a little fast on the other end of the line, and there was a grumbled unidentifiable question from Rick before Morty stammered out, “You aren’t – jeez, nothing’s wrong? You’re sure, Summer?”

“No, Morty, I’m just…” concerned? horrified? _sorry_? “…calling to talk.” When Summer glanced up to Nira, her girlfriend smiled faintly in a reassuring kind of way.

“Oh,” Morty breathed, and it didn’t make any sense but she sounded almost _sad_. Rick grumbled something, a harsh rasp, and Summer leaned closer to the speaker in time to barely catch Morty say “maybe – maybe it’s something else,” away from the phone.

Summer frowned.

The line went almost completely dead except for the faint rustling of something on Morty’s end (sheets or clothes, something fabric) and Summer grew too aware of the sound of her own heart pounding in her ears.

Suddenly Summer couldn’t think of a single thing to say. Nira’s lamplight eyes were on her, passive and supportive, but Summer was floundering. She wracked her brain, trying to think of common ground after _years_ apart – anything but the dive bar they’d both visited earlier that evening - and unfortunately the first thing she clawed at was no less awkward.

“I haven’t talked to mom in, like, forever,” Summer broke the tense silence, internally grimacing at herself a moment later when Nira shifted and a small frown line appeared between her whiskered eyebrows.

Mom wasn’t a safe subject and she never had been. There was a reason Summer talked to her even less than she talked to Rick and Morty and she knew, maybe had _always_ known, that Morty carried more of their mother’s ire than she deserved to bear.

When Summer was younger, she had reveled in being _someone’s_ favorite since Rick made his allegiance to Morty so obvious, but looking back, she didn’t feel like she was mom’s favorite so much as she was another adult in the house, someone else to rely on, someone else to _vent_ to. Not a daughter but not quite a friend, either.

And as time and distance grew between Summer and who she used to be, it was simpler to let herself embrace the things she wished were true. ‘ _I don’t have a mother_ ,’ she’d told Nira almost a year ago, and it hardly even tasted like a lie.

Mom never called or texted or stopped by just to check up on her like Nira’s mother did. She never sat any of Summer’s friends down at the kitchen table to gentle but prying questions so she could ‘figure out what kind of person my daughter cares for’. Mom had never made Summer feel _loved_ or _cherished._ Most he time she didn’t even feel _liked._

Cutting off contact was easy and probably better for both of them.

Nira shifted a little, an uncomfortable move that pulled her knee away from Summer’s, and Summer tried to shape her face into something apologetic. “I wonder if she’s doing okay,” she heard herself say faintly into the phone when Nira’s eyes dropped to her knees.

“Oh, yeah, she’s pretty good,” Morty answered brightly and Summer’s mouth dropped open.

“Wait, how do _you_ know that?” Summer asked, her stomach sinking as Nira leaned forward and covered her chest with the bedsheet. Her dark fur caught the moonlight filtering in through the glass ceiling like light reflecting off black water and Summer ached for the mistakes she couldn’t seem to stop making.

“We visited her like… two weeks ago?” There was another indistinguishable grumble from Rick and Summer forcibly turned her attention back to the phone call. One problem at a time. “Yeah,” Morty said but she sounded far away, answering Rick, maybe. Then her voice gained strength as she elaborated to Summer, “Mom’s good. She’s doing really well at the hospital – you know, the one in the Andromeda Galaxy? She’s got friends and a – there’s a _guy_ she’s seeing, too.”

“Oh.” That was… unexpected. After what da – _Jerry_ – did, Summer had a hard time looking at men the same way. That her mother could move on so easily shouldn’t have surprised her but somehow it still did.

Rick grumbled something again and Nira turned back to frown at the phone, her face reflecting Summer’s thoughts back to her. She fought off the rush of relief to exchange a look (one they shared often on the battlefield) and Summer held the phone up higher, both of them tilting their ears closer to the speaker. She caught something like ‘ _not anymo-_ uuugh _-re’_ in Rick’s unmistakable rasp before Morty spoke over his voice. “Oh – I guess they broke up or something. But she’s – you know, she’s putting herself out there again, so that’s good.”

‘ _What about you, Morty_ ,’ she longed to ask but she couldn’t force the words out of her mouth. Instead what came out was: “Wow. I didn’t think you’d still keep up with Mom.”

“It isn’t really - _Rick_ makes sure to stop in with her about once a month,” and there was something doting in her tone, something _affectionate_ , and Summer felt the sting of bile in the back of her throat. “Otherwise he gets worried.” Another grumble, something like ‘ _yeah right_ ’. “Mom is –” Morty sighed and Summer felt the weight of it across the universe. “- You know how mom is.”

God, did she ever. That was why Summer stopped checking in. Mom was always angry. And when she got drunk, she liked to shit-talk Jerry. Summer actively tried her best not to even _think_ about him and she _especially_ didn’t want to know how unimpressive he was sexually - she already knew too many of his preferences to stomach - so she’d stopped worrying so much about her mother’s fragile mental state and started worrying about her own.

It wasn’t something Summer regretted.

Nira’s eyes met hers again and there was a brief flash of memory. Summer was trying to hold her mom’s hair back and angle her head towards the toilet bowl but Beth kept pulling away, kept trying to slap away her hands, slurring aggressive, ‘go away!’s and ‘jusss leave me _aloneeee_ ’s in between wretching, a half-full wine bottle still clutched in her hand and sloshing red liquid all over the bathroom rug.

“I’d fucking _love_ to,” Summer bit out between her teeth, propping her dead-weight mother up as she listed to the side for the _thousandth_ time and catching her head before it smashed into the side of the porcelain tub.

And Summer was _scared_. Scared that if she left her mother like this, she’d die. That she’d choke on her vomit or hit her head and bleed out. Rick was MIA and Morty was away on a field trip and da – _Jerry_ – was a disgusting piece of shit and _gone_ and Summer had never felt so alone and out of her depths in her entire life.

“Wha-if Dad doesssn’t comeback?” mom slurred and Summer wanted to roll her eyes but she was too busy doing the math on blood-alcohol levels and whether mom would be sober enough (or unconscious enough) for Summer to leave for school in less than two hours.

But that was a stupid distraction and mom unloaded red wine and bile in a sloppy hot stream right onto Summer’s lap, ruining forever her favorite pair of white pants.

Summer blinked and she was back in the yurt with Nira, who was looking at her with wide yellow eyes that weren’t quite _pitying_ but weren’t quite _not_ either. Padded fingers found Summer’s thigh and despite everything she felt a flash of relief. That was what made Nira so _good_. She understood Summer. And forgave her for more than she should.

Morty’s silence on the other end of the phone lengthened with every second and Summer dragged herself back into the moment, the air in her chest thick with words left unsaid but when she heard a grumbled, ‘ _you done yet?_ ’ she was jolted into action.

“There’s this girl I like,” Summer found herself blurting and she grimaced to herself. Woah, what? She hadn’t really meant to say that. And it sounded kind of stupid, sputtered out of the blue like that. But she hadn’t known what else to say and she _hated_ the idea that Morty might hang up and roll over and curl up next to Rick like what they were doing was _normal_ and _domestic_ and not a fucking travesty.

She caught Nira’s eyes and it was hard to tell beneath her innate stoicism but she seemed… pleased.

“That’s great, Summer!” Morty said and Summer could _hear_ the smile in her voice. That smile she hadn’t seen for years until she was turning it on Rick like he was the center of the fucking universe. “What’s she like?”

Summer’s attention strayed to Nira and there were a million things she could have said about her. That she was brilliant and lightening quick - with a set of daggers and a gun and her wit. That she was the most sensually beautiful creature Summer had ever touched, that she made Summer think love _wasn’t_ just some bullshit the weak clung to out of a fear of dying alone.

Bizarrely, what wound up coming out of her mouth was, “She’s from the Virgo Stellar Stream.” She caught Nira’s smile, the flash of her sharp teeth through the dark, and she wondered how much of those thoughts Nira had glimpsed darting across the surface of her mind or whether it was her face that had given them away.

“Oh no way! Can she do – is it true what they say about – about Virgo Stellar? Can she mind-meld or – or Force Bond or whatever?”

“She can but it’s not _common_ , Morty, and it’s kind of offensive to ask. Don’t be so _speciest_.”

Morty laughed at that, a delighted peal that made Summer feel like she was eighteen again, and she heard Rick grumbling something in the background. A chill ran down her spine when she realized Morty was probably talking to Summer on speaker phone as well, Rick silently listening in on their conversation.

The pointed ears on the top of Nira’s head quirked towards the phone and Summer bristled.

“What?” Summer demanded, maybe harsher than she meant to be, but Morty was saying “I _told_ you – you don’t know everything,” as a quiet aside not meant for Summer. The affection dripping from the words made Summer swallow heavily and Nira’s eyes met hers.

“Rick owes me money,” Morty answered, speaking more clearly into the phone. “He - he said that was a bunch of bullshit but I guess even geniuses can be wrong sometimes, right?”

Summer swallowed again, her mouth suddenly dry as a desert and she knew she’d pussy-footed around the issue too long. Nira’s fingers gave her knee a reassuring squeeze and apparently that was enough to bolster her resolve. “So you’re still –” she had to cough to clear her throat, “- you’re still hanging around with Grandpa Rick, huh?”

She had meant to sound indifferent; was trying to keep her tone _light_. Instead it came out laced with the disgust she’d been trying to beat back, the words dark and threatening and foreboding. Nira’s eyes widened infinitesimally with the shift, her breathing deepening, chest falling and rising in a deliberate, even pace. To someone else, it might have looked meditative and peaceful but Summer knew it was anything but.

The silence on the other end was thick. She could tell, just from the weight of it, that Rick’s interest had been piqued. Last they’d spoken, all those years ago, they were on good terms. They used to text regularly, sending each other funny memes or tips about where to get good weed. Hell, it was _her_ who sent him the picture of their bounty poster; she had meant it as a joke, had thought he might laugh about it.

Boy had she read that wrong.

Since the day she’d saved his ass with a rocket launcher and his follow up offer to buy drinks, she hadn’t heard from him at all. Long periods without communication weren’t unusual and Summer refused to take it personally but something there felt wrong, she just couldn’t piece it together.

Morty’s voice was tight when she firmly answered, “Yeah, me and Rick still – yeah, we’re still together.”

Summer cringed at the word _together_.

“Isn’t he –” _shit_ , she had to breeze past her slip up, she had to make up some excuse, “- getting a little old?” Fuck, that was flimsy, but it was the best she could do. Nira quirked up an eyebrow at that. After all, she was one hundred and thirty six - but that didn’t count; Nira’s species aged differently, it was a totally different situation. Luckily Nira didn’t seemed offended.

Morty laughed a little but the sound of it raised the hair on the back of Summer’s neck. It was _practiced_ sounding; _fake_. Nothing like the real laughter she’d heard earlier when Morty had been teasing Rick. “Rick’s always been _old_ , Summer,” she said lightly. _Too_ lightly. “And it’s not like – I mean _I’m_ the one who struggles to keep up.”

If Summer hadn’t seen her earlier that day, hadn’t seen Rick curl his fingers around her thin throat, she might have believed the forced humor Morty tried to inject into the conversation. Instead she could feel Rick’s laser attention focused on her, searching her out across the galaxy, trying to pin down what Summer knew and how she knew it.

But Summer was done with being blind to her grandpa’s faults just because he waved a magic remote and made life a little more interesting. She wasn’t _beholden_ to him anymore. And Morty shouldn’t be either.

“Where are you guys living these days?” Summer asked, a little bit of her old bubblegum-pop making her question sound off-hand and half-disinterested. “You aren’t on earth still, are you?”

“No we’re –” there was another grumble, a notable ‘ _Morty_ ’ in a dark growl, and Morty’s brief pause was almost passable as her stutter, “- we’re off planet.” Nira shifted, turning to face Summer and lean her head closer to the phone, a frown pulling down her features. Her eyes met Summer’s, cat-slit pupils thin as a needle, the orange-yellow of her irises glowing in the dark.

“Where?” Summer asked, almost _barked_ , and she felt her heart start to pound. If Rick wouldn’t let her speak to her sister alone, she’d hunt her down. Because she was growing more and more convinced Morty didn’t need a friend; she needed a _rescuer._

And how convenient that was _exactly_ the business Summer was in.

“We – ah –” another deep grumble and Morty hissed something back in a whisper that sounded a lot like, “ _Rick, don’t_ ,” and then she said, “- well I can’t – I _shouldn’t_ tell you. Sorry, Summer.”

“Why not?”

Rick bit out, ‘ _cause we’re wanted across half the multiverse, Summer_ ’ just low enough that Summer barely made out the words and then Morty repeated, “Cause we’re wanted across half the multiverse, Summer,” with a lot more regret.

“Right.” Morty was in _trouble_. And judging from the way Nira’s ears lay flat against her skull, she thought so too.

But taking on _Rick Sanchez_ was suicide.

Summer could hang up. She could laugh it all off, shove it to the back of her mind, and never think about that bar and those smiles and that _kiss_ ever again. And if she was _really_ lucky, Rick would let her random call and pushy curiosity go ignored.

“Sorry,” Morty breathed again and Summer _hated_ that she was apologizing. She was _always_ apologizing, always so fucking pathetic, always getting stuck places she couldn’t work her way out of alone.

But _fuck_ , Morty hadn’t fallen into Rick’s hands on her own, she’d been custom wrapped by mom and Jerry and _Summer herself_. And maybe before Summer could pretend she didn’t see something wrong because she was a teenager and it _wasn’t her fucking job_ but now it _was_. It _had to be_. Because no one else was going to do it.

Nira’s eyes flashed to Summer’s and that buried thing was floating to the surface, hideous and bloated like a sunken corpse and Summer wanted to scream, wanted to tie a weight to it and drop it back down into the darkest depths of her psyche but it was too late. She was already standing in the doorway of her parent’s bedroom, watching Jerry thrust into the limp form of her sister, early afternoon sunshine unforgivingly bright.

Maybe Summer was _always_ standing in that doorway, stuck in a trance as the man who used to be her father severed the very last tattered thread of her trust.

Then Nira and her were blinking at each other in the dark, Nira’s face slack with sympathy and horror and understanding and before Summer could muster up the will to scoff or say something crass or otherwise try to write off that terrible moment she’d rather forget, Nira was climbing out of bed and dressing herself quickly in the fitted leather armor she favored when they planned to bust heads.

“No, Morty don’t be sorry –” Summer said strongly, mind working a mile a minute. Nira turned and Summer’s form-fitting duro-flesh armor landed next to Summer on the bed. “– You know if you wanted to meet Nira, you could always stop by.”

Summer had to get Morty away from Rick and get her to safety. Her and Nira and Tromulon and Mika wouldn’t be much against _Rick_ but Summer knew a couple people who might be willing to help if they had the right incentive. Money mostly. And that was doable. Not ideal but doable. Fuck, if they were going to take on _Rick Sanchez_ , her and Nira probably wouldn’t live long enough to retire, anyways.

Summer stood up, tossing her phone onto the bed and scrambling to pull on her armor.

“Oh – yeah – that sounds –” there was more grumbling on the other end and both Summer and Nira froze, dropping their ears closer to the phone to try to make out words but she didn’t catch anything besides the vaguely begrudging tone. “Yeah,” Morty concluded, sounding happy. Too happy. Summer’s stomach hurt. “We could do that.”

With her shirt on, Summer snatched the phone up and held it closer to her mouth. Her breathing might have been a little ragged when she hinted, “You don’t _have_ to bring Rick. You can always stop by on your own, you know. We can do a –” _fuck_ “- a girl’s day kind of thing.” It was as close to a suggestion as she could drop on the phone with Rick sitting there listening in but it didn’t feel like enough. Morty had been _thick_ as a kid and considering everything, Summer really doubted she’d grown out of that.

Morty breathed out a little sound like a laugh and Summer couldn’t decide if it was a good thing Morty seemed unfazed with tension or if the lack of Rick grumbling in the background was a bad omen. “We’re kind of a package deal,” Morty admitted with entirely too much fondness in her voice and didn’t Summer fucking know that. Rick and Morty. Inseparable since the day they’d met. Intergalactic terrorists and incestuous lovers. Quite the pair.

“Right,” Summer couldn’t help but answer sardonically. Nira was already fully dressed, running her hands over all the places she had hidden knives strapped to her ensemble, tightening the last buckle on her bracer. Summer tossed the phone back onto the bed so she could tug on her pants.

“Listen Summer, are you – you don’t sound okay…” Rick grumbled something and Morty was much more frantic when she rushed to say, “Cough twice if you’re being held prisoner!”

Summer snorted. There was absolutely _nothing_ funny about what was happening but she couldn’t hold in a slightly hysterical peal of laughter. Oh the irony. “No, Morty, it’s nothing like that it’s just… Listen, why don’t we meet up tomorrow?” Somewhere neutral. Somewhere safe. Somewhere Summer had a lot of allies, people who _owed_ her, people who would back her up at a moment’s notice. “On Gurgablurg.” Nira cut her an approving glance and grabbed her own phone off the nightstand, clawed fingers tapping away as she sent off rapid fire texts.

“Gurgablurg –” Morty cut herself off with a laugh and Rick’s deep grumbling barely registered through the static. “ _Did you seriously just use the word ‘podunk’?_ ” Morty asked incredulously, obviously addressing whatever Rick had said, and Summer felt her face twist into a scowl. “What’s on Gurgablurg?” Morty said much more clearly.

“A bar. The Rusty Wheel. It’ll be right up your ally; it’s a real dive.”

Summer realized a moment after she said it that she’d made a mistake.

‘ _I_ told _you, she saw us_ ,’ Rick’s baritone rumble vibrated through Summer’s hand and all the way down into the pit where her stomach used to be.

“Oh is – is it?” Morty asked haltingly, and Summer’s panicked eyes landed on Nira right as a swirl of particles pin-wheeled into existence between them, Nira’s dark fur reflecting back the eerie green light.

“Rick _, no!_ ” Morty’s thin voice pleaded over the phone and then Rick was _there_ , there in Summer’s yurt, shirtless and stormy faced and stepping over the dirty laundry strewn across the floor with bare feet. In Summer’s distorted sense of time, his arm lifted in slow motion, pointing a weird double barreled gun at her face.

And for one second that stretched on for eternity, Summer thought ‘ _Was it always going to be Rick_?’ with a sort of detached fatalism that felt more like a dream than the hyperawareness that usually shot through her system when she was looking down the business end of a pistol. What inexplicably followed that was the thought ‘ _has this happened before?_ ’ because it sure as fuck felt like it had.

There was a grunt and a bright flash that blinded Summer even through her closed eyelids as she braced for pain that never came.

“ _Shit_ ,” Rick cursed and Summer’s eyes snapped open. Rick’s head was downturned, looking at his bare arm where a dagger - one of _Nira’s_ daggers - was buried hilt deep in his forearm, the pointed blade protruding from the other side of his arm and dripping a steady stream of blood onto the floor.

Nira’s quick instincts had saved Summer; the knife jolting Rick’s arm off his aim. Rick glanced from the knife to the woman in question with interested surprise.

But his curiosity didn’t last longer than a fraction of a second. Almost in tandem, Rick lifted his bleeding arm, aiming the double barreled pistol at Nira, unfazed by the knife still protruding from his forearm while Nira slid another dagger from her hip holster and pulled back her arm to throw.

With a panicked shriek, Morty stumbled through the Portal - _adult_ Morty - and she threw herself in between Rick and Nira fearlessly, arms raised, her back to Rick. “ _Woah – oh jeez_! _Stop_!” she commanded, her voice firm and steady, so unlike the Morty that Summer remembered. “Okay everyone, let’s just _calm down_.”

But Morty’s sudden appearance broke Summer’s daze and she slid her hand into the open drawer pressing into her back and drew her own pistol; a laser gun she’d stolen off a corpse a few years ago, one that recharged in less than a nano-second and fit her hand like it was _made_ for it. “Rick, drop the gun,” Summer demanded, pointing it at Rick’s head.

And she didn’t see it happen, somehow even though she was _watching_ him, he moved too fast for her to react, but the hand that had previously been empty now held a second gun, this one familiar and single-barreled and steely blue. There was a blast of heat and Summer’s laser gun was gone, ricocheting off the wall in a half-melted mess, her hand stinging but mostly undamaged.

“ _Summer_ –” Morty whined in a frustrated warning before she jerked her head towards Nira in a double take. “And – and is this – are you Nira?” she asked, her voice awkward and a little shy and it was like stepping through time. Morty might _look_ a little older, and might even act it sometimes too, but she was still _Morty_ , still that clueless kid that needed someone to hold her hand when she crossed the street, still the embodiment of innocence despite whatever Rick had done to her. “Oh, _wow_.” Summer spared a quick glance to Nira, trying to see what Morty might be seeing. Her black fur glowed slick and shiny, her coin-bright eyes glinting shinier than the two knives she held up and at the ready. The portal irised closed behind Rick and Morty’s back and the room plunged into the semi-dark of moonlight. “Uhm, hi.”

“Nice to meet you, little sister,” Nira said, her words not unkind but her voice icy cold with battle lust. And a strange mourning that this was how they met - that the first time Nira saw Morty she was shielding a man that was clearly a monster - made the moment more bitter than it should have been. Nira would have probably liked Morty. She had a weakness for wounded animals.

“Wo- _ooough_ -w is right, Sum-Sum,” Rick belched and Summer had forgotten how he did that, how he liked to burp in the middle of his sentences. Bizarrely, Summer felt a wave of embarrassment that he was doing that in front of _Nira_ who he was currently sizing up with predator eyes. “I gotta admit, I’m impressed.”

“Morty, get out of the way,” Summed demanded, her eyes locked on Rick who had tucked away his blue blaster, seemingly confident he only needed the double-barreled pistol even though he was outnumbered.

“Wha – no way!” Morty cried and Summer spared her a quick glance. No weapons. No armor. Just – Summer swallowed heavily – a very familiar teal sweater over bare legs.

“Morty, _out of the way_ ,” Rick’s gruff voice repeated Summer’s command but Morty stood her ground.

“Jeez Rick, can’t we just talk this out _for once_?” she pleaded and Summer’s mind backed up the tape and repeated ‘ _for once_ ’ like a broken record echoing against her skull.

“ _Morty_.”

“Morty,” Summer commanded, doing her best to sound authoritative but sisterly. “Go outside. You’ll be okay, I promise. Just leave this to me.”

“Leave _what_ to you?!” Morty demanded, her gaze wide with panic. Her hair was a messy tangle of bed-head and the unmistakable glimmer of tears reflected starlight from the corners of her eyes as she looked between Summer and Nira. With three careful steps, she backed up into Rick’s chest and spread her arms, using her body to shield him. “I’m not gonna let you _hurt_ Rick.”

“As if they _could_ ,” Rick goaded, an eye-roll audible in his voice but he kept his stare steadily divided between the two women.

Nira interjected darkly, “My knife in your arms says otherwise.”

Rick was more feral looking than Nira when he bared his teeth at her in a grin. “Barely even feel that, baby,” he simpered while he yanked Nira’s dagger out of his arm and tucked it into the back hem of his pants, Summer noticing too late that his fly was unfastened, an uncomfortable strip of his greying skin and blue-white happy trail disappearing into his pants.

Summer resisted the urge to pinch her brow in frustration, trusting Nira to keep her eyes on Rick while she turned her attention to her younger sister and tried to sound as reassuring as possible when she mostly wanted to strangle her. “Morty, I know you don’t understand, but this is for your own good.”

“It’s – _Summer_ ,” and what right did Morty have to look so… so _disappointed_. “I know you _think_ it is, but you have to trust me on this.”

“No, Morty, you have to trust _me._ I saw you tonight. The two of you. At the bar.”

Morty looked completely unimpressed. Almost bored. Certainly not guilty or shocked or anything Summer expected considering she’d just been told she was caught _tongue kissing her grandfather_. Instead Morty’s brown eyes were fathomlessly dark under the dim starlight of the glass roof, her features pale – so different from Summer’s memories of her as a child and yet utterly the same.

“I want to _help_ you,” Summer said, hating the pleading edge to her voice.

“I know, Summer,” Morty smiled, but it was a watery, tepid thing. “I know you do.”

In Summer’s periphery, she saw Rick’s electric gaze cut down to Morty, a brief flash of _something_ slicing across his features, and Nira, seeing the same opening Summer had just spotted, drew back her arm lightning fast.

“ _No, please don’t_!” Morty begged but Rick had already shoved Morty out of the way and onto the bed in a tangle of skinny limbs. Rick _caught_ the dagger in a terrifying show of skill, his yellowing teeth glinting in the dark when he smirked.

Whatever Summer had been expecting, it wasn’t for _Morty_ to dive at Nira like a wild animal, tackling the much larger woman to the ground in a flurry of pale legs and black fur. Before Summer could make sense of the mess of body parts, Morty had Nira pinned on her stomach, arm wrapped around her throat in a headlock. Rick started to move towards them and cold dread filled Summer’s stomach.

Summer liked to think she was a good mercenary. In their group, she was second only to Nira in speed and brutality but she couldn’t do anything but rush forward stupidly, arm stretching out in a desperate grasp, only to be too slow to reach him as he pointed the double-barreled gun into Nira’s wide eyes and pulled the trigger.

The scream Summer let out was pure rage and horror. She threw herself at Rick but with upsetting ease, he shoved her away and she slammed against the nightstand hard enough to bruise.

Summer dimly heard him murmur, “This is a little trickier with a third party,” as she tried to find her footing on unsteady legs.

“ _I can’t believe you_!” she screeched when she was finally able to shape her agony into words, scrambling over the bed, desperate to get to Nira, _knowing_ it was too late, but Rick’s hand caught her around the bicep like a steel cuff and he held her back.

“Hold on, Summer,” he hummed as she uselessly fought his hold. “ _Calm down_.”

“You just _shot_ my –” she trailed off, hypnotized by Morty untangling herself from Nira’s strong limbs and struggling to get a glimpse at Nira’s head – her intelligent, perfect head that was no doubt leaking viscera all over their floor.

“Your _what_ Summer?” Rick interrupted her thoughts with a harsh bark. “Say it.”

“- my - _my girlfriend_ …” Summer sobbed desperately. She had only _just_ started using that word inside her head, Nira’s coy smile unbearably sweet and contagious the first time it had slipped past Summer’s lips once, maybe twice, each occasion momentous because Summer hadn’t used titles like that since – she didn’t like _titles_ because they came with expectations and those _always_ led to disappointments but Nira had _never_ let her down and now she would never see that smile again.

Summer turned, her hands clenched and bunching into a fist, while she glowered at Rick who looked entirely too pleased with himself. “Wow, you’re really making progress. Here I was worried Jerry fucked you up for good.”

“ _You fucking asshole!_ ” she screamed, her swing going wide when he ducked under her arm and kicked her leg out from under her, the world titling when she unexpectedly slammed backwards and landed on the bed. “ _You’re just as bad as dad_!”

“ _She’s not dead Summer_!” Morty shouted to be heard over Summer’s furious screaming, and Summer nearly spat up her heart when her mind caught up to Morty’s statement. “It’s just her memory! We only erased her memory!”

“It’s –” Summer took a moment to watch Morty as she struggled to prop Nira up in her arms. Nira’s beautiful cat-like face was undamaged, no laser blast or hole or burnt hair. Her eyes were closed but her whiskers and ears were twitching the same way they did when she was asleep. “ _What_?”

Morty smoothed the fur on Nira’s forehead as Summer slammed to her knees, arms outstretched to wrap around Nira’s limp but warm body. “She’s just fine,” Morty promised, shifting her weight under Nira’s arm, clearly trying to leverage her up to the bed. “See?”

“ _Don’t you fucking touch her_.”

It was out of Summer’s mouth before she thought the words through and she knew immediately that she would remember Morty’s wide eyes for the rest of her life because she watched something die in the blacks of her pupils – something small and fragile that Summer wanted to cup her hands around like a flickering candle light but it had already blown out.

Morty dropped Nira’s arm like it burned her, backing up on hands and knees, her eyes on the floor. She didn’t stop until she was crouched at Rick’s feet, her fingers clenched in the hem of the sweater Summer just _knew_ was his.

The submissive display made Summer’s chest ache with a visceral reminder of what had led them to this moment – or maybe it was the big hand Rick lowered to rest on the top of Morty’s head, the lines of his face exaggerated in the semi-darkness.

“I didn’t mean…” Summer started, utterly drowning in how _small_ her sister seemed in comparison to Rick. With renewed vigor, she started again, “Listen to me Morty, this isn’t okay. _You_ aren’t okay.”

“ _Summer_ –” Morty whined, her eyes still on the floor.

“ _Rick_ ,” Summer bit out, glaring up at the man in question but he only had eyes for the girl crumpled at his feet. “He’s manipulated you or something. Groomed you probably. Can’t you see that, Morty?”

“Summer, I –” she started again, her face titling up enough that Summer could make out the furrow of her brow.

“I can help you get away, Morty,” Summer promised, hefting Nira into her arms cautiously. _That_ got Rick’s attention, his laser bright eyes searing a hole through her head. But Summer wasn’t about to back down for a sick pervert like Rick. Not when Morty was so _so_ alone. “Me and Nira, we can _help_ you. We have friends. Safe places.”

Rick rolled his eyes but it was Morty’s surprisingly firm voice that made Summer frown.

“I don’t need any help.” Morty’s eyes were off the floor now, boring into Summer like dark pits that never saw the light of day.

“ _Yes you do_ ,” Summer bit out, losing patience. It was so long since she had to be gentle she’d forgotten how to do it.

“I – I understand how this looks to you, Summer. How it _always_ looks to you –”

Summer’s exhale left her in a little gasp. “Wait – _always_?”

“Shit Summer,” Rick grumbled, reaching down and hauling Morty to her feet with a grip on her upper arm. Morty let him tuck her under his arm and there was something about the way they stood there – smashed together like a single unit – that filled Summer with a bone-deep sort of dread. “Didn’t you hear Morty? You really think this was the _first time_ we’ve had this discussion?”

A splice of vertigo hit Summer so hard she lowered her defensive stance and sank onto the bed next to Nira.

“Summer, I _chose_ this…” Morty continued but her voice was distant. “…and I _keep_ choosing it. I know it’s not – not _normal_ or _okay_ but it works for us.”

Summer was barely paying attention, wracking her brain for memories that _should_ be there but absolutely were not.

“And do you really think you could do _anything_ about it?” Rick snapped but even his bullshit ego wasn’t enough to register over Summer’s panic. “I’m a fucking god –”

“ _Rick_ ,” Morty hummed, warningly.

“I’ve – we’ve done this before?” Summer finally bit out, horrified. If she couldn’t trust her own _memories_ , what did she fucking have?

“Yeah,” Rick answered flatly.

“It’s – it’s kinda the only reason you call anymore.” Morty smiled but it was teary and tremulous and she briefly tucked her face into Rick’s chest while his arm tightened around her.

“How many times?” Summer demanded weakly, trying to dredge up something – _anything_ – from another altercation and getting _nothing_. Not even a wrinkle where something didn’t add up. Just seamless, uninterrupted time.

Morty sniffled but she rolled her eyes to the plexiglass ceiling while she gave it some thought.

“Uh – tonight makes seven?”

“Eight,” Rick corrected easily, with another eye roll. “This isn’t –” He huffed out an aggravated sigh and restarted. “You’re _smart_ Summer. Even – even when we don’t do anything obvious you figure it out and get all upset and then careen on a mission to ‘ _rescue Morty_ ’. And while I appreciate the sentiment –” his crystal eyes landed on her and she _knew_ how deeply he meant that, a strange bubble of uneasiness blowing up in her guts “- it would be a lot easier if you started trying a little harder to get used to the idea.”

Summer’s gaze landed on Rick’s huge hand, his fingers gripping Morty’s shoulders, digging through his own sweater like claws.

“ _Never_.”

She half hoped her hard refusal would rile him up; she was _itching_ to fight, to use her fists and her teeth and her fingernails to tear him apart even though she _knew_ he would win. Instead he nodded like that was _exactly_ what he expected – maybe even what he _wanted_ her to say.

And that was the worst of it. She could _see_ it in his eyes that he cared about Morty. Jeezus, she’d _always_ seen it, even when he refused to admit it himself.

“This is the first time you got someone else involved,” he rasped, changing the subject abruptly.

Morty smiled at that, her gaze jerking shyly to the still slumbering Nira at Summer’s side. “That’s – Summer, it’s good you’re opening yourself up. Nira seems really nice.”

Summer refused to take the bait. “So what, you’ll just _erase_ all this? Take it all back, act like it never happened?” Summer wished it was harder to believe.

“I wouldn’t have to if you’d just let it go but I know you can’t. Trust me - it’s better for _both_ of us if I just control-z this shit.”

“But… Morty,” Summer asked, a little desperately, scrubbing at her eyes and running a hand through her hair. The back of her throat felt thick with tears but she didn’t want to cry, what good had _crying_ ever done for her? So she shoved the feeling away and plowed on, “You can’t be _happy_ like this.” 

Rick expression went carefully neutral and Summer didn’t miss the way that he just barely stiffened in a way that almost seemed… insecure.

“Yeah, I am,” Morty breathed immediately, her answer ready and sure. She didn’t look like she was lying (and Morty was a _terrible_ liar – or at least she had been when last Summer knew her), nor did she sound like she was saying what was expected of her. It was a strangely genuine response and Summer didn’t know quite what to make of it - nor the way Rick ever so slightly deflated, his face falling lax with relief.

“I’m happy, Summer. _Really_ happy. I mean – when I was a kid, I didn’t think _this_ is where my life would take me…” it was hard to know if she was referring that specific moment in time - in Summer’s yurt where Rick was still gripping his memory gun - or if it was a broader commentary on the shape of her life, “…but yeah.” Morty tilted her chin up to cut a look at Rick and the adoration, the _affection,_ was clear on her face. “I can’t complain.”

And there was that tone again, that gentle, sincere, _loving_ tone that made the part of Summer that feared attachments curl up on itself in anguish. Summer’s eyes traitorously watered but she refused to blink the tears free.

“You _could_ complain,” Summer pouted, feeling impossibly out of her depths. “You could complain to me. If you wanted. I would listen.” Morty laughed outright at that, a pleased sound with just a bite of sadness, and the look she turned on Summer was wistful.

“Are _you_ happy, Summer?” Morty asked, leaning her shoulder into Rick’s side and batting wide, brown eyes at her that demanded sincerity. Summer tried to ignore the small shift, the way Morty wrapped her arm around Rick’s back and pale fingers curved over his bare hip.

Summer _had been_ happy. She was less so now, knowing so many things she wished she didn’t and hating even more that it was all right on the cusp of being taken away.

But Nira was still lying beside her, her familiar weight dipping the bed, and the stars were bright and clear over their heads and maybe Summer didn’t _have_ to get involved after all. Morty was an adult now. Capable of making her own decisions. And Rick… well Rick had always had a specific Morty-shaped soft spot.

At least Morty _thought_ she was happy.

“I don’t know,” Summer grit out between her teeth, the hard bite to her voice directed at Rick.

“You’ll be okay once you’ve forgotten,” Rick promised her, and she hated that he didn’t sound angry or aggressive or mean. It would have been easier to understand – to assume there was nothing good there - but the weird, new gentleness to his face spoke of some big change that hurt too much to imagine.

“It doesn’t feel that way now,” Summer grumbled, and she hated how _young_ she sounded.

“No shit. It never does.”

Summer braced herself but for all that the two of them were standing imposingly a few feet away, hovering over her where she sat hunched at the edge of her bed, Summer could tell they were still uneasy carrying out their threat as the silence stretched on.

It was Morty who broke the tension.

“Summer I – I’m sorry,” she whispered through the dark like it was a secret, her voice cracking, and Summer finally snapped, her face crumpling into the tears she didn’t want to shed but that she couldn’t ever escape from.

“Morty, _no_ ,” Summer begged angrily, digging the heels of her palms into her eyes to try to stop herself from crying. “Don’t be – Morty don’t be _sorry_. This isn’t your fault. I let this happen to you, Morty. _Everyone_ let this happen to you and _I didn’t_ – I _could have_ –”

Summer cut herself off when she felt the air stir in front of her knees, opening her watery eyes to find Morty crouched in front of her, wet eyes wide, tears dripping down her cheeks, her hands outstretched like she wanted to put them on Summer’s knees but wasn’t sure the touch would be tolerated.

That flicker of fear – the fear of being rejected – snapped Summer out of her fugue and she dropped to her knees, wrapping her arms around Morty with bruising force and crushing her to her chest, wishing desperately that she could tuck her up inside her rib cage and keep her safe forever – imagining she could reach an arm out through time and drag her sister behind her and load her up in her spaceship with all the other garbage she had _thought_ was valuable when instead she left the most precious thing behind.

Morty was painfully skinny to hold, small and slight and so breakable.

“ _Summer_ ,” Morty soothed through her own tears, her arms wrapped around Summer’s waist lightly like she was afraid of hurting her but Summer only squeezed her closer, trying to make up for the gulf between them but knowing it was only caving in. “You always try to save me, Summer,” Morty whispered desperately, her chin notched over Summer’s shoulder, breathing out a watery laugh that ruffled Summer’s hair. “ _Every time_.”

Summer stole a glance at Rick against her better judgement, irrationally embarrassed that of all the people in the universe it was _him_ watching her completely loose it for the first time in… well… probably since the last time she was staring down the double barrels of his memory gun and _leaving Morty alone_ _again_.

He was watching them but it wasn’t with the sneer of disgust or annoyance that she expected. Everything about his face was purposely neutral. His unibrow a flat slash across his forehead, his thin lips a tight line. But Summer could _tell_ , she could _tell_ from the dark emptiness in his eyes that he wasn’t happy, wasn’t _gloating_ like she’d feared he would be. And he might have thought he was hiding it better but Summer _knew_ he was tearing himself up over Morty and her sad little sobs that echoed uncomfortably around the high tech yurt.

_Good_.

“It means a lot to me, Summer,” Morty breathed and her arms finally wrapped around Summer’s waist tight enough to help hold Summer together. “It means – Summer, it means _everything_ to me _._ ”

Summer breathed out a wavering sigh and relished the feeling of her time ticking away, the same way you could feel the heat from a fire in the next room by touching the doorknob. Rick was going to take all this away, just like he’d taken this away before, just like he’d do again the next time she discovered what he’d done and the time after that, and the time after that – until something big changed or one of them died.

It felt inevitable. _Rick_ was inevitable. And Morty – _jeezus poor Morty_ – had gotten so mixed up in his web there was no untangling her.

Summer and Morty would go back to being estranged. Back to their separate lives. And Summer would go back to being the Summer who she had become – the one who never talked about her little sister or her mom, the one haunted by the closed door upstairs and the pounding on the other side, the one who never told her _girlfriend_ any of the things that mattered because she was nothing but a horrible, greedy, traumatized child deep down.

And maybe Morty knew it too – that she was about to be left behind. Maybe that was what Morty’s whole _life_ was, her presence getting erased from anywhere it might actually matter, because when Summer finally loosened up her hold enough to give Morty room to back away, her expression was so tender it nearly hurt to look at it.

Morty smiled and Summer didn’t think she’d ever seen her look so sad. “I love you, Summer,” she whispered into the dim moonlit darkness with such sincerity it broke Summer’s heart. She tried to memorize Morty’s face. Those fathomless dark eyes. The harder planes of her adult face. Starlight reflecting off the tears still brimming in her eyes.

Morty tilted her head up and Summer followed her gaze, looking out the plexiglass ceiling to a sea of stars, the black just starting to turn purple with dawn.

_Please_ , Summer begged the vast emptiness of space. _Please let me remember this._

In the periphery of her vision, Morty’s face crumpled into a fresh wave of tears.

“I love you too, Morty,” Summer exhaled, the words almost drowned out by a flashbulb burst.

* * *

Summer woke up.

She kept her eyes pressed closed, the sunlight streaming in through their glass ceilinged yurt painting the backs of her eyelids orange.

She’d had a weird dream. She couldn’t remember it at the moment but if felt _important_. As she lifted a hand to rub her eyes, even that thought faded, especially when she felt Nira’s claws drag lightly over the armor covering her back.

They had fallen asleep in their clothes again. Must have overdone it on the drinking. That made sense, the last thing she remembered was a dive bar and glasses of beers clanking together and the faces of her smiling friends. It would probably be smart to text Tromulon and Mika, apologizing for whatever drunken stupidity she’d undoubtedly spewed in a blackout. Hopefully it wasn’t anything too embarrassing.

She blindly grasped for her phone on the nightstand and, squinting against the light, unlocked the screen, her fingers moving on autopilot, navigating the interface with purpose though Summer was still half asleep.

Except, when her eyes had adjusted to the light of midday, she wasn’t staring down her messaging app trying to word ‘ _Sorry if I was a mess last night_ ’ without actually saying sorry. She was glaring into the scared, wide-eyed face of her sister and the furious glower of Grandpa Rick.

The wanted poster she’d found years ago. The only photo she made sure to transfer to every new phone, the one she compulsively checked to be sure it survived every upgrade. It was _important_ , just like the dream she forgot and the night she couldn’t remember. She knew it in her bones.

It had been a while since she pulled that old picture up and, as always, Summer tried to stare through those huge brown eyes and make sense of their dark depths. On the surface Morty looked scared and young and in way over her head. She had a black eye and a split lip and a nose bleed and dirt crusting her face.

But underneath all that was a fire Summer had never seen in anyone else. A determination. A strength Summer only pretended at. One that burst out of Morty with a ferocity that put Summer and her band of mercenaries to shame. It smoldered through the glass screen of Summer’s phone, burning hotter than Rick’s steely glare, cutting a line through Summer’s heart, making Morty’s liquid brown eyes molten lava.

Then Nira turned, a sleepy groan breaking the quiet, and Summer closed the photo app, dropping her phone on the nightstand and burying her thoughts before Nira woke up enough to brush against them.

Wherever Morty was - wherever _Rick and Morty_ were - Summer ached with the hope that they were happy.

**Author's Note:**

> Part two of my oneshot mini-series. Ouch, does this one hurt or what? But Summer, man. _Summer_.


End file.
